


The Joust

by Ptolemia



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-26
Updated: 2015-02-26
Packaged: 2018-03-15 06:52:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3437633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ptolemia/pseuds/Ptolemia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sera and Tabris used to play the same silly games in the alienage as kids, so, naturally, when Tabris turns up at Skyhold, tomfoolery and merriment occur.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Joust

**Author's Note:**

> Tabris is Queen because I like happy endings and crowns and elves. Everything that happens in this fic is super fluffy and happy for kind of the same reasons I guess. What can I say, I'm an optimist.

It's an absurd sight, thinks Lavellan - the usually stoic Hero of Ferelden perched on the King's shoulders and giggling (giggling!), her normally tight-coiled hair tumbling loose over her shoulders and down her back. On the other side of the courtyard, Sera frowns appraisingly up at Cullen.  
“He's not as tall as your one, right? We gotta swap. You're taller than me as well, 's not fair!”  
Tabris laughs. “They're identical, I'm sure. Only... Cullen might be a little more handsome.”  
“Hey!” protests Alistair.  
She swats affectionately at his head. “Pipe down, you.”  
“Just because he has a pretty scar...”  
Cullen looks vaguely embarrassed, an expression quickly replaced by mild alarm as Sera motions for a leg-up and scrambles onto his shoulders, almost kneeing him in the face as she does so.  
“Watch yourself, yeah?” she says, “I almost had your eye out!”  
Cullen mumbles something, but whatever it is, it is drowned out by the sound of Alistair sighing dramatically.  
“I'll have you know that I also have a scar,” he says, pouting.  
“The one on your little finger from the time you put your hand in a bear trap to see if it was still working?”  
“... yes.”  
“Not really an attractive scar, darling.”  
“Oh, picky picky picky...”  
She bends down and kisses the top of his head.  
“Urgh,” says Sera, emphatically. A disgusted noise of which Cassandra would be proud, thinks Lavellan, if Cassandra wasn't currently so busy looking absolutely enchanted at the King and Queen and their slightly sickeningly lovey-dovey expressions.  
“Urgh!” Sera repeats, loudly. “Gross!”  
“Sorry,” says Tabris, who doesn't look very sorry at all.  
“Neither of them looks like they're all that, if you ask me. Pair of tits.” Sera snorts, “Ha, tits. Geddit? Tits!”  
“Tits?” asks Tabris, looking faintly bemused.  
Sera shrieks with laughter and almost falls off Cullen's shoulders. “It's funny because of boobs, yeah? Anyway, look, are we gonna joust or what? I want the biggest stick. Heh. Biggest stick. Ha!”  
Alistair laughs, Cullen looks slightly mortified at Sera's ongoing commitment to really poor innuendo, and from the way Tabris is cocking her head to one side, Lavellan suspects that she still doesn't get it. It's incredibly, really – the woman must be thirty years old and she doesn't understand a basic dick joke.

Bull hands both competitors a stick, giving Sera first choice. She kicks her legs back and forth as she considers her options.  
“That hurts, you know,” says Cullen, after a while. “I don't have my armour on, you realise that?”  
“Good, it'll toughen you up. Bull, which one looks best?”  
Bull hums thoughtfully. “Don't know. I've not had the honour of seeing our Hero fight, so it's hard to get tactical... but I reckon you want to land the first blow. Unseat her quick, don't give her a chance to use her muscle. Go for the longer one.”  
“It's a bit spindly, though...”  
“Well then, try not to break it.”  
“Yeah, whatever.” Sera takes the stick and hitches it onto her shoulder. Bull hands Tabris the other one and she does the same. The two elves narrow their eyes at one another.  
“Ready?” asks Varric.  
“Ready,” says Tabris.  
“Get a move on!” says Sera.  
Varric shakes his head at her. “Alright, starting positions, then. Cullen, over by the big tree, Ali- that is, your Majesty... hmm. Over near the wall back there?”  
“Is this safe?” mutters Josephine, as the two men line themselves up at opposite sides of the courtyard, Sera and Tabris bracing their makeshift lances and hunching forward, staring each other down.  
“That is a really good question,” says Cullen, who looks distinctly concerned. Cullen often looks concerned, but Lavellan has to admit that facing down the woman who slew the Archdemon, even if she is only wielding a big stick and an expression of deep concentration, is not exactly a fun situation to be in.  
Sera, who is grinning wildly, seems to think otherwise. “It's fine. We used to do this in the alienage all the time.”  
“And I'll remind you that I taught you everything you know!” says Tabris, rather primly.  
“You taught me everything you knew, sure. Not everything _I ___know.”  
“Fighting talk, little Sera.”  
“Only 'cos I'm gonna win.”  
“So long as I don't break anything...” mumbles Cullen.  
Sera pats his head in what is probably intended to be a consoling manner. “Nah, mostly people just loose teeth. Breaking stuff is... not so often. 'S fine, yeah. Come on, we ready?”

Varric nods. “On the count of three. One... two...”  
“Three!” yells Sera, kicking Cullen in the chest. “Yah! Giddyup!”  
Cullen stumbles forward, slightly winded. Alistair sets off a split second later, but considerably more steadily. The two men gather pace, Sera and Tabris both keeping their makeshift lances level. They get closer... closer... from this angle it's clear just how much longer Sera's stick is, and it seems fairly clear that she'll hit Tabris straight off Alistair's back before the other woman even has a chance at victory. Then they're just a few feet apart, almost within striking distance, and Sera lowers her lance just a tad, brow furrowed, shoulders braced, victory already in sight, and then...

And then, in one fluid movement, Tabris drops her lance, twists aside slightly and grabs onto Sera's stick as they gallop past. Cullen keeps running, Alistair keeps running, Sera and Tabris both maintain their grip and suddenly Sera is yanked off Cullen's shoulders and is in the air, clinging to her stick for dear life and shrieking, while Tabris grips the other end with one hand and grins. Even at this distance Lavellan can see the muscle ripple along the Hero's arm. She feels slightly faint. In a good way, though. In a very good... 

Alistair lists to one side, just a little. And then quite a lot. And then definitely a lot, and then, with a series of loud shouts, the King, the Queen, and Sera all go tumbling into a patch of Elfroot. Sera is the first to get up, shouting loudly about how Tabris hit the floor first, and then Tabris is also on her feet and denying any and all claims that such a thing is true, and then Alistair chips in that he reckons he saw Sera hit the ground, and Sera is protesting that his opinion is biased and Varric says he saw Sera land first but Josie reckons Tabris went down a split second before and Cassandra would like to make it VERY clear that-  
“Rematch!” yells Sera, “We gotta go again, nobody's got a clue, yeah?”  
All eyes swivel toward Cullen, who is stood stock still the other side of the courtyard and looking as though he just escaped death by a hair's breadth, which, in fairness, could well be true.  
“No,” he says, firmly. “I'm going to go and have a very stiff drink.”  
He stalks off in the direction of the tavern, tailed by Dorian, who slings his arm over the Knight-Commander's shoulders and says that he very much approves of that sentiment, and then he leans in and positively _purrs_ that “if you ever feel like giving _me_ a chance at getting my legs up over your shoulders, you're more than welcome.”  
Cullen grumbles something which sounds a lot like “I might just take you up on that one,” but Lavellan must be mishearing him. Surely.

And then she turns back to the crowd in the courtyard, and Sera is sizing up Krem as a possible Cullen replacement for the rematch, and Cassandra is asking the Hero to sign something, and Lavellan smiles because, for now at least, all is well.


End file.
